Summary

Terminally deprecate the RMI Activation mechanism.

Problem

The RMI Activation mechanism is an obsolete part of RMI that has been optional since Java 8. It is effectively obsolete; it is disused; and it imposes a maintenance burden on the JDK. See JEP 385 (JDK-8244917) for additional information.

Solution

Terminally deprecate the RMI Activation mechanism, including the java.rmi.activation package, including the public, top-level classes and interfaces it contains. Also deprecate the rmid tool.

Specification

Zip files of the webrev and specdiff of corresponding changes to the specification are attached. The specdiff is rather difficult to read, as it is cluttered by the boilerplate deprecation text added by javadoc. A brief summary of the specification changes is as follows:

• add a deprecation notice to the java.rmi.activation package specification
• add a deprecation notice to the java.rmi module specification
• add the annotation @Deprecated(forRemoval=true, since="15") to each public, top-level class or interface in the java.rmi.activation package